


Given Names

by orphan_account



Series: More Beautiful for Having Been Broken [4]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, polyamora
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-24
Updated: 2017-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-23 06:45:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10714311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Written for the tumblr prompt:Astra calling Maggie "Margaret" and Alex "Alexandra" and whatever resulting reactions you choose :)





	Given Names

Astra addressing her by her given name was, for Alex, a throwback to a time when they were less intimate.  In the very beginning, in those days before Astra’s death, “Alexandra” was what Astra would breathe into her ear during their rough, hot, stolen fucks.  That and occasionally, “Ah, human!”

It was a throwback to a time when they wanted each other, desperately, but felt trapped by circumstance, a time when they were on opposite sides of a war and all they could do was steal these moments, these scorching, closeted moments.  A time when they didn’t know each other, not really.  Not like they did now.

It had taken Astra a long time after she had returned, after they had become lovers and had settled into a comfortable life with Maggie, to break herself of addressing Alex as Alexandra.  Astra thought of her as Alexandra, liked the name, felt it was bold and sounded powerful and womanly and suited her perfectly.  It had taken a bit of teeth-pulling to get her to use “Alex” around the house.  Eventually she did, finding the diminution of the name charming, though only after a while. So when “Alexandra” occasionally fell from her lips, Alex always found it telling.

Either it would happen when she was sleepy, perhaps waking in the small, pale hours before the alarm’s shriek.  She would shift in the bed and, if she was next to Alex on that particular morning, would burrow her cheek into the soft part of Alex’s shoulder and murmur, “Alexandra.”  Alex found it oddly endearing when she did it then.

Or, she would come up behind Alex and murmur it in her ear when she wanted sex, or whisper it like a prayer in bed when Alex was undressing her and kissing down her stomach.  Maggie seemed to like it under those circumstances too. Maggie felt silly addressing her as Alexandra, and she never would, but from Astra, it was hot and beautiful and felt right.  

Or else, she would use it when she was attempting to impress upon her the importance of something she was trying to express.  And it worked, to her credit.  The weight of her full name coming from Astra’s lips was enough to snatch her focus.

Alexandra was her real name, as far as Astra was concerned, and she was really just humoring her with this Alex business.  At times of great importance, or else when she was at her most raw, she would have no truck with that nickname.

Amusingly, the reverse was true for Maggie’s name, Margaret. 

Shortly after they had all moved in together, Astra plucked a piece of mail off the counter and examined it.  “Who is Margaret Sawyer?” she demanded aloud to nobody in particular.  “Maggie, is that your mother?”

Maggie laughed.  “No, come on.  My mom was named Terezinha, you know that.”

Astra frowned.  “Then who is Margaret?”

Maggie waved a hand at her, wagging her fingers.  

“You are Margaret?”  Astra frowned.  She shook her head after a moment, as she had when she had been told that Alex preferred to be called Alex.  “You are not a Margaret.”

Maggie laughed.  “Yeah, I’m not. That’s why I’m Maggie.”

But then Astra pursued her later.  “But why, if you parents took the trouble to name you Margaret, did you choose Maggie?”

Maggie sighed.  “The nickname choices for Margaret aren’t real great.  Be grateful I didn’t go with Marge.”

Astra grimaced.  What an unpleasant combination of phonemes.

But for reasons that nobody, including Astra herself, could quite explain, she was persistently tickled by this new information.  She auditioned the name at the dinner table:

“Margaret, please pass me the ketchup?”

Alex almost fell out of her chair laughing.  Maggie chuckled a little and passed the ketchup.

And then again, later, tugging Maggie’s shirt up over her head as they were preparing to go to bed, she paused, kissed Maggie on the end of her nose in the sort of playful manner that Maggie often did to her, and tried it out again:

“I am looking forward to getting you out of the rest of your clothing, Margaret.”

Alex doubled over and cackled.  Maggie scowled.  Astra had an amused little smirk playing around the corners of her mouth.  

Maggie stabbed a finger into the middle of Astra’s chest.  “That would be a total mood killer if you weren’t…”  She looked her up and down once, shaking her head in wonder at the sheer power of Astra’s physique.  “...well, YOU.  But don’t do that again!”

They fell asleep after making love, Maggie in the middle this particular evening.  As they drifted off to sleep, Astra whispered in her ear, with an overarticulation to the M and the T:  “Goodnight, Margaret.”

On the other side of her, Alex snickered.

But the question still persisted.

“Why are you a Maggie?  Your parents chose the name Margaret for you, but you are not Margaret.  You are Maggie.”

Maggie smiled.  She understood what Astra was asking.  She had been working hard to instill in her Kryptonian lover an appreciation for the raucous, scratchy rock and roll of the late sixties and seventies and she said, “OK.  I think I can explain easiest this way.”   


And she thumbed through her phone, and pulled up the song “Maggie May,” by Rod Stewart, but a live version sung by Melissa Etheridge.  It was bare-bones and raw, and it was gentle and angsty and raspy and bore the lingering aches of sex and innocence lost.  Astra listened quietly for a moment.

“That,” Maggie said when it was over, “is why I’m not Margaret.  That’s why I’m Maggie.”

Astra nodded slowly.  “I understand.”

Alex, in her essence, was Alex, but Alexandra was part of her too; Alexandra was her warrior name, the name of the spirit of her deepest passions, the name that had weight to it.

Maggie, by contrast, was only Maggie.  This Margaret person was never who she was, was never part of her.  She was thoroughly Maggie, her soul suffused with an energy that was very much of a piece with what Astra felt in the song.  Margaret was a name for the government, for legal documents and nothing else.

Alex considered this for all the next day.  She had never given much thought to the level of ownership of her own name, how it shaped and defined her in ways that she never considered.  And she probably never would have done, had her Kryptonian lover not pushed the issue.   _ Everything happens for a reason,  _ she thought with amusement.

Alex was at the barbecue the next night, grilling some corn and vegetables for Maggie and some steaks for herself and Astra.  Astra was watching an episode of Game of Thrones that she had missed, which Maggie had already seen and didn’t feel like watching that particular death scene again.  So she wandered outside to the deck and came up, placed her hand on Alex’s shoulder, and murmured teasingly in her ear, “It smells wonderful, Alexandra.”

Alex snorted.  “Quiet, Margaret.”

  
  



End file.
